Chandrababu Naidu’s Telugu Desam Party on Friday parted ways with the BJP led NDA over the Centre’s refusal to grant special category status to Andhra Pradesh. TDP president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu announced his party’s decision during a teleconference with party politburo. A majority of party members including MPs, MLAs and senior leaders had already told the TDP chief to quit the alliance.
The story of separation started on March 8 when two of the TDP’s ministers – Ashok Gajapathy Raju And Y S Chowdary, resigned from the Modi cabinet on this issue. However, the party had stopped short of walking out of the alliance that time.
TDP has 16 members in the Lok Sabha and its pullout does not threaten the NDA government at the Centre.
Hours after TDP president N Chandrababu Naidu announced in Amaravati that the party was exiting from the NDA, TDP leader Thota Narasimham moved a no-confidence motion in the Lok Sabha on Friday.
Andhra Pradesh’s ruling party had on Thursday offered to back the YSR Congress’ no-confidence motion but has now said it withdraws the support as it smells a nexus between it and the BJP.
The motion can be accepted only if it has the support of 50 members in the house. With the BJP alone having 274 members in the 536 member Lok Sabha and enjoying support of allies, the no-confidence motion, if accepted, is certain to be defeated.
